英語美文：我爲什麼活着
摘要：三種簡單而強烈的情感支配着我的生活：對愛的渴望、對知識的追求和對受苦之人的同情?這些情感就像大風一樣，把我隨風捲起，飄忽不定地越過痛苦之海，來到了絕望的邊緣。
Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life, the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a great ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair.
我爲什麼活着
I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy-ecstasy so great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of life for a few hours of this joy. I have sought it, next, because it relieves loneliness-that terrible loneliness in which one shivering consciousness looks over the rim of the world into the cold unfathomable lifeless abyss .I have sought it finally, because in the union of love I have seen, in a mystic miniature, the prefiguring vision of the heaven that saints and poets have imagined. This is what I sought, and though it might seem too good for human life. This is what-at last-l have found.
三種簡單而強烈的情感支配着我的生活：對愛的渴望、對知識的追求和對受苦之人的同情?這些情感就像大風一樣，把我隨風捲起，飄忽不定地越過痛苦之海，來到了絕望的邊緣。
我追尋過愛，首先，因爲它給我帶來了莫大的喜悅——這喜悅是如此的強烈，往往會讓我犧牲生命中其他的一切只爲了體驗幾個小時愛的喜悅j其次，它排遣了寂寞——在那種可怕的寂寞之中，一個顫抖的靈魂，越過世界的邊際，進入那酷寒，深不可測而又了無生氣的無底深淵，我追求過愛，最後是因爲在愛的結合中我看過聖人和詩人所希冀的天堂的微縮景象這就是我所追尋的人生的境界，這似乎對人類而言太過美好，這是我最終所發現的。
With equal passion I have sought knowledge. I have wished Lo understand the hearts of men. I have wished to know why the stars shine. And I have tried to apprehend the Pythagorean power by which number holds sway above the flux. A little of this, but not much, I have achieved.
我對於知識有着同樣的渴望二我希望能瞭解人類的•心靈，我想知道爲什麼星星在夜空閃爍：我試圖去理解畢達哥拉斯學派的力量即用數字去統治那些不理性二在這個方面，我有點小小的成就。
Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward toward the heavens. But always pity brought me back to earth. Echoes of cries of pain reverberate in my heart. Children in famine, victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people a burden to their sons, and the whole world of loneliness poverty and pain make a mockery of what human life should be. I long to alleviate this evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer.
如果愛和知識是可能的，那麼他們能帶我們到達天堂：但是人類的苦難又使我回到了人間。忍飢挨餓的孩子，被壓迫的人民，無助的老人成了孩子的負擔，還有滿世界的孤獨，貧困和痛苦對於人類生活的理想進行了無盡的嘲弄二我想遠離這個惡魔，但是我無能爲力，所以也我痛苦着。
This has been my life. I have found it worth living, and would gladly live it again if the chance were offered me.
這就是我的生活。而且我覺得這樣的生活很值得：如果能再給我一個機會，我會很高興再活一次。
英語學習筆記:
1. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a great ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair.
英語點睛：使用動名詞等使句子變得更加緊湊。
2. because it relieves loneliness-that terrible loneliness in which one shivering consciousness looks over the rim of the world into the cold unfathomable lifeless abyss.
英語點睛：使用了很多令人印象深刻的形容詞。
3. I long to alleviate this evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer.
英語點睛：這裏用的是too的基本用法，但常常被初學者忽略。
學習更多：
ting were the rejoicings when Peter reached the home under the ground almost as soon as Wendy, who had been carried hither and thither by the kite.
(Peter Pan裏面的句子)彼得和溫迪是差不多一起回到家的，溫迪一直被風箏帶着到處亂飛。當他回到家的時候，他高興極了。
feeling was confused and drifting, but deep and un-fathomable.
(描寫心理感受)這思緒是散亂而飄浮的，又是幽深而莫測的。
3 onion has layers, and our monsters have layers, too.
(too在句尾的用法)洋蔥是有層次的，我們怪獸也是有層次的。
